Aug 2, 2013

07:33 AM

A Top Museum of Modern Art Curator Giving Talk at a Torrington Gallery

By Esteban L. Hernandez

Ann Temkin.

A top curator at one of the most illustrious museums in the world, the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan, is presenting a lecture Saturday at an up-and-coming gallery in Torrington.

Five Points Gallery will host Ann Temkin, chief curator of painting and sculpture for the Museum of Modern Art, for a talk entitled “The 21st Century Artist”. The lecture is open to the public and begins at 7 p.m.

Temkin is a Torrington native who has served in her role as chief curator since 2008, where she has overseen several museum exhibits. Her lecture at Five Points is the first of what the gallery has called the Five Points Lecture Series. McElhone said in the release that the series will focus on expanding the public’s appreciation and understanding of the contemporary art movement.

Judith McElhone, executive director at Five Points, said Temkin is on the gallery’s advisory board. She was asked to present a lecture and graciously accepted, McElhone said. “She is such an amazingly knowledgable person,” McElhone said of Temkin. “She is certainly one of the most influential people in the modern art world."

McElhone said that as an artist, she is looking forward to listening to Temkin’s lecture. Contemporary art can be difficult unless you have a background in it, McElhone said, so one of the goals of the gallery is to make contemporary art more accessible to the general public.

“We are thrilled to have people from all kinds of backgrounds come into the gallery. We love that; that’s what we want to encourage,” McEhlhone said. She said she wants to make the gallery and events like the lecture series available and accessible to Torrington residents and people in surrounding areas as well.

A pre-lecture champagne reception starts at 6 p.m., with tickets available for $50. The tickets include VIP reserved seating for the lecture later in the evening. The release said proceeds from the reception benefit the gallery’s “Five Points Challenge” capital campaign, which is a five-year plan to continue expanding, renovating and creating more partnerships. The gallery announced in June that it had partnered with the University of Connecticut’s Torrington campus and the University of Hartford.